Lesson 12:

Taking actionOverviewStudents brainstorm the benefits of human rights and equality to their own lives and their community. You can then choose for them to create a visual display of talking heads that promote the benefits to their school or they could work in role of equality and human rights champions, pledging to take some form of action that will help to defend and promote equality and human rights in their community.

Starter Activity 1 (5-10mins): Importance of equality and human rights (Slides 3-6)Using the slides and Post-it notes, get students to write down why equality and human rights are important to their own lives and everyone in their community. They should list as many reasons as possible. Stick them on the wall and discuss. Highlight that equality and human rights are all about them, but also about how we live together as a community. Encourage students to become equality and human rights champions, taking an active role to promote and protect equality and human rights.

MainActivity 2 (40mins): (Option 1) Talking heads (Slide 7)Group in 4-5s. Using the slides, explain that to promote equality and human rights in school, they are going to produce a vibrant display of talking heads. Provide each group with 4-6 talking head templates on worksheet 42. Using the outcomes from activity 1 as prompts, students should write short statements on each head to provoke positive thoughts about equality and human rights. They should add design to make them colourful and diverse so you will need to provide art materials and could offer things to make them into collages. They should be cut out and made into an impactful display in a prominent place in school e.g. dining hall. Pull together all the talking heads for class discussion.

Activity 2 (40mins): (Option 2) Pledge (Slides 8-11)Group in 4-5s. Explain that students are going to make a pledge to help to tackle equality and human rights issues in their school or wider community. They will need to identify an equality or human rights issue, and then create a solution for how they can tackle it. It could be anything from pledging to raise awareness of why inappropriate use of the word ‘gay’ is offensive, to producing a documentary about a particular group of disadvantaged people.Inspire students by playing video 4 which shows some young equality and human rights champions, making pledges and taking action with support from the Equality and Human Rights Commission. Allow each group 25-30mins to work on their pledge. Then each group should share their pledge and explain how they will deliver it. You could extend this activity into another lesson or even a suspended day activity, where students develop their pledge further.

Learning objectives

Appreciate the benefits and importance of equality and human rights.

Be able to promote and protect equality and human rights in my school and community.

Subject links

Citizenship PSHEE English Drama Art

Resources

Worksheets:42 - Talking heads43 - Self review Video 4: Champions Slides: Lesson 12 Stop Sexual Bullying extension resource

Lesson 12:

Taking actionPlenaryActivity 3 (5mins): Self review (Slide 12-13)Reinforce the importance of respecting difference and each other’s human rights using the slide. Then have a class discussion about what students have learnt and to raise any questions they still need answered. Hand out worksheet 43 for them to complete a self review.

Support notesExtension/homework/extra activity ideasUse these ideas as inspiration for alternative, differentiation or homework activities, or to develop learning in other subjects or lessons.Extension 1 - Human rights and equality charitiesStudents could research different human rights and equality charities and campaigns. They could select one and find out how they help to promote and protect people from discrimination and their human rights. Depending on the time of year, students could get involved in something like the Amnesty International Christmas card campaign, International Human Rights Day or Christian Aid Week.

Extension 2 - Published materialsStudents could research and read publications produced to help promote human rights, such as The Right Stuff magazine, produced by children for the Children’s Rights Alliance for England: www.crae.org.uk/networks/human-rights-magazine.html or Know Your Rights, produced by the Equality and Human Rights Commission: www.equalityhumanrights.com/advice-and-guidance/your-rights/young-people-know-your-rights/ They could be tasked to work in role of a writer, producing their own publications for their peers.

Extension 3 - Assembly Students could create their own assembly for a lower year group, promoting the most important lessons they have learnt about equality and human rights. They could be encouraged to be as creative, thought-provoking and interactive as possible.

Extension 4 - Stop Sexual Bullying The Stop Sexual Bullying resource, produced by Womankind Worldwide, helps young people to play an active role in making their school a safer, more equal place. Sexual bullying and gender equality could be an issue your students choose to tackle in activity 2 and the resource could be used to support them.

Differentiation ideas All activities should be completed in mixed ability groups. Differentiation for activity 2 will be by outcome.

Useful links/further information

Visit the useful information section of Equal Rights, Equal Respect to access this information:www.equalityhumanrights.com/equalrightsequalrespect/usefulinformation Background to equality - background information to equality, protected characteristics and equality law.

Background to human rights. Glossary - glossary of keywords.

Visit the training section of Equal Rights, Equal Respect to access this information:www.equalityhumanrights.com/equalrightsequalrespect/training Equality and human rights training video - training tips for delivering interactive activities.

Lesson 12:

Taking actionPrior learning Requires an understanding of human rights and equality to promote their benefits and importance (Lesson 5-10). If you have only taught equality or human rights, it could be tailored to one of these principles.

Preparation and planning Review the PowerPoint slides and tailor them to suit your teaching and class ability.

You will need to decide whether to deliver option 1 or 2 for activity 2. Photocopy enough copies of the talking heads for each student for option 1. Organise some art and collage materials so they can really inject some design into them.

Photocopy worksheet 43 to enable independent review at the end of the lesson.